GamePolitics - Comments for "Maxis GM Addresses Decision to Make SimCity Require a Constant Connection "http://www.gamepolitics.com/2013/03/15/maxis-gm-addresses-decision-make-simcity-require-constant-connection
Comments for "Maxis GM Addresses Decision to Make SimCity Require a Constant Connection "enRe: Maxis GM Addresses Decision to Make SimCity Require a ...http://www.gamepolitics.com/2013/03/15/maxis-gm-addresses-decision-make-simcity-require-constant-connection#comment-285846
<p>In other words: They didn&#39;t need to make it always-online, they simply chose to.</p>
<p>The reasons for doing so are irrelevant because plenty of games run quite well with both&nbsp;singleplayer and multiplayer game modes. The Action RPG genre is an area with which multiplayer is almost a given, and yet games like Torchlight II or Borderlands 2 don&#39;t <em>require</em> the user to be online to play (aside from the usual Steam caveats which can be bypassed).</p>
<p>There was no reason to restrict people in such a knee-jerk, draconian manner, and all this completely disregards the fact you can bypass the online check anyway!</p>
Tue, 19 Mar 2013 20:14:46 +0000Mr.Tastixcomment 285846 at http://www.gamepolitics.comRe: Maxis GM Addresses Decision to Make SimCity Require a ...http://www.gamepolitics.com/2013/03/15/maxis-gm-addresses-decision-make-simcity-require-constant-connection#comment-285795
<p>I agree. I hate playing online. Too many other people are always messing up the game experience. The only online game I enjoy is Left 4 Dead, and even that is beset by griefers. I much prefer to play alone, whether it&#39;s a shooter or a strategy game like Sim City.</p>
<p>As for this &#39;vision&#39; of an interconnected Sim &#39;world&#39;, it&#39;s called Sim CITY, not Sim World. I don&#39;t want regions with other players. I want my own city. That&#39;s all.</p>
Mon, 18 Mar 2013 11:29:35 +0000Bennett Beenycomment 285795 at http://www.gamepolitics.comRe: Maxis GM Addresses Decision to Make SimCity Require a ...http://www.gamepolitics.com/2013/03/15/maxis-gm-addresses-decision-make-simcity-require-constant-connection#comment-285793
<p>That&#39;s my biggest concern about games increasingly going online.</p>
<p>&nbsp;</p>
<p>Hell, I get the weird feeling that what you stated may be part of the intent. Why make a game that lasts when you can kill it the moment you release the next one?</p>
Sun, 17 Mar 2013 17:10:29 +0000hellfire7885comment 285793 at http://www.gamepolitics.comRe: Maxis GM Addresses Decision to Make SimCity Require a ...http://www.gamepolitics.com/2013/03/15/maxis-gm-addresses-decision-make-simcity-require-constant-connection#comment-285789
<p>They really need to hire a PR person or fire whomever their PR trainer is because Lucy and her staff just keep digging the hole deeper and deeper with this BS.</p>
Sat, 16 Mar 2013 19:27:12 +0000PHOENIXZEROcomment 285789 at http://www.gamepolitics.comRe: Maxis GM Addresses Decision to Make SimCity Require a ...http://www.gamepolitics.com/2013/03/15/maxis-gm-addresses-decision-make-simcity-require-constant-connection#comment-285787
<p>Here&#39;s the thing these companies forget when they hog-tie their games with this always-connected BS - you are time-locking your game. Eventually, interest will wane to the point that is no longer practical to maintain the servers, and you will shut them down.</p>
<p>And then, five or ten years down the line, someone will be like, &quot;Hey, remember SimCity (2013)? That sure was a great game. I should go back and play that again.&quot; Of course, they won&#39;t be able to. Instead of a treasured piece of art that people can enjoy for years to come, you&#39;re making people pay full price to essentially &quot;rent&quot; your game for an undetermined period of time. You are&nbsp;<em>actively keeping people from enjoying your catalogue, remembering your games fondly, or considering you with any degree of respect, EA.</em></p>
Sat, 16 Mar 2013 18:58:27 +0000brotherspartacuscomment 285787 at http://www.gamepolitics.comRe: Maxis GM Addresses Decision to Make SimCity Require a ...http://www.gamepolitics.com/2013/03/15/maxis-gm-addresses-decision-make-simcity-require-constant-connection#comment-285785
<p>It&#39;s not even fighting piracy, if anything it&#39;s engouraging it.</p>
Sat, 16 Mar 2013 17:46:44 +0000hellfire7885comment 285785 at http://www.gamepolitics.comRe: Maxis GM Addresses Decision to Make SimCity Require a ...http://www.gamepolitics.com/2013/03/15/maxis-gm-addresses-decision-make-simcity-require-constant-connection#comment-285782
<p>&lrm;&quot;So, could we have built a subset offline mode? Yes. But we rejected that idea because it didn&rsquo;t fit with our vision.<u><em><strong> We did not focus on the &#39;single city in isolation&#39; that we have delivered in past SimCities.</strong></em></u> We recognize that there are fans &ndash; people who love the original SimCity &ndash; who want that. But we&rsquo;re also hearing from thousands of people who are playing across regions, trading, communicating and loving the Always-Connected functionality. The SimCity we delivered captures the magic of its heritage but catches up with ever-improving technology.&quot; - Lucy Bradshaw, Maxis GM.<br />
<br />
<a href="https://sphotos-a.xx.fbcdn.net/hphotos-ash3/26271_4805353805994_125911644_n.jpg" title="https://sphotos-a.xx.fbcdn.net/hphotos-ash3/26271_4805353805994_125911644_n.jpg">https://sphotos-a.xx.fbcdn.net/hphotos-ash3/26271_4805353805994_12591164...</a></p>
<p>*GASP* It&#39;s SimCity 4 from ten years ago..and DO MY EYES DEVIEVE ME?! Its a reign&nbsp;of many many different spots for cities. You connect them together. You make deals. Trade goods and services. And you don&#39;t need to be always connected..or connected at all. You can make decisions with one city to help make another grow. Almost everything Lucy Bradshaw boasts about this game. Granted, not everything, but still. I think your &#39;vision&#39; is nothing but excuses to fight theft. I think you&#39;ve done nothing but encourage it. The game will be stripped and pirated. People will be able to play offline if they want. It will be Spore all over again.<br />
<br />
I&#39;ll stick with SimCity 4, thanks. I don&#39;t have the money to buy a broken, always connected DRM&#39;d game.</p>
<p>&nbsp;- W</p>
Sat, 16 Mar 2013 16:09:10 +0000Cecil475comment 285782 at http://www.gamepolitics.comRe: Maxis GM Addresses Decision to Make SimCity Require a ...http://www.gamepolitics.com/2013/03/15/maxis-gm-addresses-decision-make-simcity-require-constant-connection#comment-285781
<p>Without access to their tracking, it is hard to say.</p>
<p>One thing I do know though is that the gaming community that gets together online on sites like this tends to have a bit of selection bais and forgets that we do not make up the majority of customers. &nbsp;What we all like and agree with each other on does not always sync up with what the larger market likes. &nbsp;We socially engage with people like ourselves, and that leads to a certain amount of group think.</p>
Sat, 16 Mar 2013 15:40:27 +0000Neenekocomment 285781 at http://www.gamepolitics.comRe: Maxis GM Addresses Decision to Make SimCity Require a ...http://www.gamepolitics.com/2013/03/15/maxis-gm-addresses-decision-make-simcity-require-constant-connection#comment-285780
<p>Both can exist yes, but introducing new modes increases the complexity of the design, which results in longer development times and increased testing.</p>
<p>I agree that they probably should have done it, but it is important to note the cost of taking such a course. &nbsp;Single and Multiplayer may not be mutually exclusive, but one does not have to search very long to find games that had multiplayer added and single player suffered for it. &nbsp;</p>
<p>I think one meta-post-mortum I read years ago estimated that multiplayer ads about 30% to a development budget. &nbsp;Taking a multiplayer game and producing a single player mode probably costs less, but I would not be surprised if it took at least an additional 10-15% more.</p>
<p>And &nbsp;yeah, people will develop cracks that let you play offline eventually, probably a local server or something that passes back empty data for multiplayer elements and accepts saves, but it will take them time too, and I doubt they will use the same testing rigor that Maxis does.</p>
Sat, 16 Mar 2013 15:37:48 +0000Neenekocomment 285780 at http://www.gamepolitics.comRe: Maxis GM Addresses Decision to Make SimCity Require a ...http://www.gamepolitics.com/2013/03/15/maxis-gm-addresses-decision-make-simcity-require-constant-connection#comment-285779
<p>It&#39;s about Bradshaw and what <strong>she</strong> was talking about.</p>
Sat, 16 Mar 2013 12:19:31 +0000Michael Chandracomment 285779 at http://www.gamepolitics.com